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I was at the Frankfurt Automobile Show last week, the biggest automobile show in Europe. There was lots of excitement around e-mobility and most manufacturers had some new electric concept car on show. That said two of the biggest EV manufacturers in the world, Nissan and Tesla did not even have a stand there and … Continued

The electrification and digitalization of the automobile presents significant challenges to manufacturers be they BMW, Toyota, Ford, VW or Mercedes. One of the biggest impacts will be on the profitability of manufacturers which are likely to come under increasing pressure from new competitors such as Tesla and a whole pile of new Chinese competitors including over 15 … Continued

Unbelievable is a word that one should rarely use, but it is the best adjective to describe developments over the last years in the solar sector. For instance, in 2007 a 220watt 60 cell solar module, from the now bankrupt German producer SOLON, cost €822. Today a similar module costs €95. The price collapse happened … Continued

There are five key technologies, the 5 S’s of semiconductors, sensors and software, as well as solar and storage, which are poised to revolutionise our energy world in the coming years. Fossil fuels producers will be the ultimate losers. The economics of technologies such as solar and electric cars will be too good to ignore and the … Continued

At the start of every year I estimate what the global installations of solar will be. And every year I get it wrong and I continually underestimate the size of the solar market. You would think I should learn from my mistakes but I am constantly surprised by the growth in solar. I had expected a slowdown in the … Continued

The digital revolution is all around us but as an energy buyer, I have not seen any change in the way my utility interacts with me, and this is despite every utility executive telling me that they are digitalising their businesses. My interaction with my energy retailer and my local distribution grid operator are still as … Continued

I recently took part in a podium discussion organised by the European Commission on how to push innovation in energy. All of the podium panellists were asked; if Europe could do one thing, what would it be. My answer was simple: ban diesel cars. My rational was simple: diesel technology is not future proof and Europe is … Continued

I was recently at the Intersolar Conference in Munich and for the first time in many years I came back very excited about what I saw. We are seeing a big technology shift in solar with an increasing focus not only on just reducing the cost of the solar panel but also on lowering the cost of … Continued

The 3D’s, namely Decarbonisation, Digitalisation and Decentralisation are set to rip apart the energy and transport worlds as we know them over the next years. For those who embrace these forces, as opportunities rather than threats, the possibilities are endless. What we are seeing is a once in a century seismic shift in our energy world; … Continued

I recently visited the HQ of a major global automobile supplier, a company proud of their near 100-year heritage as a key supplier of components for the internal combustion engine. After a chat with management it became clear to me that they are not yet prepared for the changes that will come at them over the … Continued

The European utility market is going through the biggest upheaval in a generation. It is especially difficult for investors to navigate. Leading utilities such as E.ON, Engie and RWE have seen their share prices halved over the last five years. In stark contrast, the share prices of Enel, Iberdrola and EDP have doubled. They have done … Continued

Probably the biggest advantage that fossil fuels have over renewable energy resources is that they are easy to store. Over the last 150 years, we have spent massive amount of money building out that storage capacity and the related infrastructure. Renewables resources, on the other hand, such as solar and wind, are usually difficult and … Continued

I gave a dinner speech some months back where in front of me was sitting the former Chairman of one of Europe’s leading automobile manufacturers. My talk was on the future of energy and one of the points I was making was that the electrification of automobiles would happen faster than what most people thought. … Continued

Bruce Huber in the Economist discussing Renewable Energy: A world turned upside down. Bruce Huber of Alexa Capital, which helps fund renewable-energy investments, says business consumers are probably going to be more influential in driving the adoption of these technologies than households, because they will more quickly see how they might cut their bills by … Continued

Utility businesses models across the world are increasingly under pressure from three forces: Decarbonisation, Decentralisation and Digitalisation. These changes are so profound that they are calling into question the very existence of many utilities. No more is this so than in Europe where utilities have made, in recent years, asset writedowns totalling over $100 billion … Continued

I was at a conference recently where a senior executive from the Russian nuclear company Rosatom gave a presentation on their two new 1.2GW third generation nuclear reactors in Kallingrad, the Russian enclave on the Baltic Coast situated in between Lithuania and Poland. The presentation was about how the build out of an Eastern European grid … Continued

It is clear to me that low carbon technologies such as solar and storage will become so cheap that they will enable a shift away from fossil fuels. In the coming years, we will see renewables increasingly powering our homes and businesses and eventually over the next 30 years we will see automobiles fully electrify … Continued

If you have ever played with the Xbox Kinect, you will have a good idea of what a 3D sensor can do! If you have not, you should because using the Kinect will you give an idea of how close this technology is to a digital version of the human eye. Whatsmore, Apple will probably … Continued

The mass of wires that make up our modern lives is quite unbelievable. My house is full of plugs, extension leads, power cables, transformer boxes and charging devices. And charging the range of digital devices that make up our modern lives is a pain. I am always forgetting to charge the phone or bring a … Continued

Batteries have been around for more than one hundred years but thanks to the smart phone they have become important enablers of our modern lives. As battery technology improves they will become critical components for powering our automobiles as well as become vital assets for our power system. In fact, the coming of cheap and … Continued

Over the last decade we have seen a global boom in renewables with installations increasing every year without fail. We are however now entering a new phase were annual installations are likely to flatten out and maybe fall as we find better ways to integrate renewables into our power systems as well as find alternative … Continued

When I told my five-year-old daughter that I was buying an electric car, she was to say the least excited. But this excitement turned to huge disappointment when she realised that there was no internet in the car. It got even worse, when she realised she could not control the car with her iPad as she … Continued

When we talk about energy today the first thing that most people think of is oil, then maybe coal and gas. Increasingly people are however mentioning solar which should not be a surprise given that nearly all of our planets energy needs is already met either indirectly or directly by the sun! Plants are totally dependent … Continued

On March 31st 2016, Elon Musk the CEO and founder of Tesla announced the 2017 launch of a $35,000 Model 3 electric car with a range of 345km per and Porsche like performance with acceleration of below 6 seconds from 0-100km/h. Within a week the company had received over 325,000 orders for the new car … Continued

There is a lot of hype in and around energy storage and in particular around lithium-ion batteries which are becoming more widespread thanks to their increasing use in consumer goods and electric and hybrid motor vehicles. However, lithium-ion batteries are still too expensive for many applications and we will not see exponential growth in the … Continued